


Practice and Execution

by Sun_Sparks



Category: South Park
Genre: Internalised Homophobia, JK lots of homo, Jealousy, Kissing, Locker Room, M/M, No Homo, Piano, discovering sexuality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-03
Updated: 2019-07-07
Packaged: 2020-04-07 03:34:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19076647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sun_Sparks/pseuds/Sun_Sparks
Summary: It's not gay if you kiss your friends for practice, right?A story in which two teens experience the struggles of adolescent dating and their sexuality.





	1. Nocturnes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A couple of teens wonder if girls will think they're lame if they haven't had their first kiss yet.

A quiet yet constant whirring wakes Craig up from his sleep earlier than he’d like. He blinks twice, three times and the hardness of the floor reminds him he’s not in his own bed tonight. He rolls on his back to look at the ornate ceiling of Token’s living room. 

He glances at an antique grandfather clock that tells him it’s not much past midnight, and as Craig looks at the sleeping bodies that scatter the room, he discovers the source of the mysterious noise.

“Hey, Tweek.”

“Hey, Craig,” he says, as he flicks the fidget spinner for what might be the thousandth time that evening. His eyes stay on the plastic that lays revolving rapidly between his thumb and forefinger, never once looking up.

“What’s keeping you awake?”

“Oh, you know,” Tweek sighs, as he whirls the plastic again. “The usual.”

Craig knows ‘the usual’ well. For Tweek, it’s anxiety rearing its ugly head about everything and nothing; all sorts between the impossible size of the universe to the unfathomably small micro-organisms that exist in their own tiny worlds. The replaying and repeating of previous conversations, wondering if he should have said or done something differently, the constant wondering if he’s liked whether or not he even cares about the person who holds the opinion.

“Actually, this is about Clyde,” he says, unprompted. “Well, ngh, not about Clyde specifically.”

Craig glances over at the aforementioned, where he lays sleeping open-mouthed, contorted in a position that would surely leave him aching come the morning. It’s a sight to behold - if Tweek wasn’t about to speak his mind, he’d have grabbed his phone to take a picture for blackmail. 

Tweek begins to talk cryptically about their friend, about some kind of list that he didn’t know or care for and about Clyde’s latest squeeze; one in a long line of many that would undoubtedly last a month before breaking up over petty teenage bullshit. He mentions Token’s girlfriend too, which honestly leaves Craig more confused.

“I guess what I’m trying to say is, have you ever kissed anyone before?”

Craig tunes back in at this. He doesn’t know where Tweek was going with his rambling, or quite how it was relevant to what he was saying before. Craig isn’t good at reading between the lines, especially when Tweek is being metaphorical and obtuse. 

“Like my mom?” He says after a pause, waiting for his thoughts to catch up with him. 

“No, I mean... like a girl.”

“My mom’s a girl.” 

“You know what I mean, Craig,” Tweek says as he nestles further into the sleeping bag, careful not to make a sound. The rustling and shuffling is louder than he’d hoped and he darts his eyes across the room to check nobody is stirring.

Craig double-checks his friends along with Tweek, before admitting a quiet “no” in the smallest voice he could muster. Embarrassment colours his cheeks a soft rouge, not that Tweek could see it in the 1AM darkness. 

“It’s okay. I haven’t kissed anyone either.”

“Not even in fourth grade when the girls were selling kisses?”

Tweek confirms he hasn’t with certainty. The memory is hazy now, like watching back over a period of his life with a blurred filter, even though it wasn’t all that long ago. Fourth grade was a simpler time when teenage hormones weren’t a bother - before acne, awkward boners and other startling bodily changes put him in the frustrating limbo state that is adolescence. 

It hasn’t been kind to him so far; spots that Tenzing and Hillary would have a hard time scaling frequently pop up with a vengeance, and soft fuzz grows on his cheeks and chin in unconnected little islands - or at least, it would if Tweek wasn’t so strict on shaving it all off as soon as he notices it come through. His hair darkened with age too; less of a gold and more of a disappointing dirty brown. As for the boy opposite, Tweek couldn’t say. Craig seemed constantly growing, spiralling upwards like a tomato plant forgetting to grow outwards, looking evermore spindly with each quickly passing inch. His skin takes the occasional reddening hue and has a voice that doesn’t know whether it wants to be deep or squeaky. The pair had quickly outgrown the boyish charms that childhood brought them, much to Tweek’s chagrin.

“We beat Butters up for that,” Craig says, reminiscing. 

“Yeah, it's why I lied about it.”

The pair swap memories from those times in their lives for a while, being careful not to wake anyone else in the room up with their emphatic whispering. The conversation dies down into a comfortable silence after a while when tiredness creeps up on them unexpectedly. 

“Does it bother you?” Tweek says after a while.

“Does what bother me?”

“That you haven’t kissed anyone before--” he runs a clammy hand through his matted hair, “-- do you think girls will think we're lame if we haven't kissed anyone, man?”

The question stops Craig’s thoughts. He pauses before pursing his lips together and giving a non-committal “maybe” at the thought of the reduction in social standing. The kids in school with them are ruthless and always looking for ways to climb higher in the pecking order. As it stands, the pair are mostly invisible; they’re neither popular nor unpopular, friendly enough to most but ultimately unseen by the masses. One slip and they’d fall into the everlasting cycle of being the uncool kids.

“Should we practice on each other?” Craig whispers after a genius thought.

“Isn't that... gay?”

“No, it's practice,” Craig states boldly. “Do you want girls to think we're cool or not?”

Tweek takes a deep breath. “Okay.”

Craig shuffles closer to Tweek in his sleeping bag slowly, inch by inch until he’s face to face with his friend. Tweek looks panicked, nervous. He tries to stay cool, but his face betrays him. Eyebrows arch upwards while he gulps unintentionally, letting the nerves he was holding sink to the bottom of his stomach. His palms start to sweat and he feels disgusting.

“So, uh-- I um, how do we do this?” Tweek’s words trip and spill out of his mouth at a rapid rate. The lingering tension from anticipation is cut short when Craig takes Tweek’s shaking hands in his own and gently presses their lips together. Tweek is so taken aback, he entirely forgets what to do with his mouth.

With the tension quickly dispersing, Tweek’s shoulders start to quiver. The shaking turns full body, jerking and jiggling. He slams a hand to his mouth as he struggles to hold back his laughter and is quickly shushed by Craig so as not to wake anybody up. 

“What’s so funny?”

“Imagine if that was my first kiss with a girl,” Tweek whispers between breaths, fanning his face with his hands. “I was so nervous!”

Craig snorts in response, and is quickly met by Tweek’s hand over his face to quieten the laughter. A wet tongue darts out to coat his palm in saliva and Tweek recoils in disgust. 

“Gross, dude!” He says, as he wipes his hand on Craig’s sleeping bag. “Take that back.”

Craig licks his own hand this time and tauntingly pushes it in Tweek’s direction. “Nope,” he provokes. “It’s yours now. And how are we supposed to kiss with tongues if you’re scared of a little spit?”

“I-- oh, true,” he concedes. His arm becomes slimy as Craig pulls him in closer, but with a new found confidence, Tweek is the one to cause their lips to meet.

Kissing is a strange act, he thinks, as their noses collide. The bumping is awkward and throws them off their rhythm. He’s secretly glad Craig suggested this, in any case. He’d die of embarrassment if anyone else knew how inexperienced he is. The kisses are sloppy and inexperienced, with teeth and braces getting in the way and far too much saliva. The speed needs to be worked on; they went into it quickly but not overly enjoyable for either of them.

“This feels kind of gay,” Tweek says as he pulls away.

Craig shakes his head, for both Tweek’s peace of mind as well as his own. “It's just practice. Less tongue?” He says, wiping his mouth.

“Less tongue.”

Craig leans in slowly for their next kiss, which turns out to be remarkably better than the last. It’s tender and with none of the haste of what they did before. Tweek remembers that closing one’s eyes is something people tend to do when they’re kissing, but surprises himself when he realises they were already shut. He flutters his eyes open briefly to find that, despite the darkness, he can see Craig has done the same. They part with a warm feeling in their chests and a buzzing on their lips.

“Um, what do we do now?”

“I don’t know,” Craig says with a mighty yawn and nestles into the comfort of his sleeping bag. “Maybe we should just keep this between us.”

“I think that’s a good idea. Should we keep practising?”

“Yeah, but only once a week so it’s not gay.”

“That makes sense,” Tweek whispers as he put some distance between himself and Craig. “Saturdays?”

“Saturdays.”

Tweek goes to sleep that night with a whirlpool of feelings spinning around his guts; the emotional equivalent of the excitement of fireworks combined with the fear that it’ll fall before it takes off and shoot towards the crowd. He dreams of a small rowing boat for two, floating gently on a placid sea that turns turbulent and assaults the boat with boisterous waves. The contents get knocked overboard and as the shock of the cold water hits him, he wakes to see Craig smiling happily through dreams of his own.


	2. Trois Gymnopédies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Straight boys in a locker room are gayer than fellas who kiss each other.

The air in the locker room is thick with the smell of stale sweat, feet and the Axe deodorant that a bunch of teenage boys had been using in place of a shower. It itches in Tweek’s throat and he feels disgusting for it. Nausea strikes at the thought of the amount of bacteria around them - the sooner he gets changed out of his kit, the better.

Others in the changing room aren’t nearly so hasty. Clyde walks around shirtless, flexing the muscles he has, albeit not that many. In the competition of who can be the manliest, Clyde offers to wrestle everyone for the title of Ultimate Supreme Masculinity. Tweek knows this is what Clyde called it based on how many times it was shouted out. A few challengers appear in the form of Dogpoo and Stan, but they ultimately decide there just isn’t enough space in the locker room to set up any kind of championship.

Would Clyde actually win if it went ahead? Tweek doesn’t think so, but then he doesn’t always feel that someone’s toughness is directly proportional to how manly they are. Wendy is tough, but the embodiment of femininity, he muses. It’s a strange indicator.

Craig ignores the shenanigans from his friends, his back firmly to the group that seemed to be cheering for a wrestling match. He laughs to Tweek about how ridiculous the whole situation is, occasionally throwing a glance backwards to see what was happening.

“Wow, who’s your girlfriend, Craig?” The obnoxious voice of Cartman brings the attention of all the boys their way. Craig freezes momentarily; panic shoots through his veins as he considered their secret was out. He decided to ignore everything his classmate just said - it’s better not to engage. “I thought being whipped was just a metaphor, but look at your back!”

Craig hastily pulls his t-shirt down over his head to cover his growing, gangly frame. He has no idea what’s actually on his back, having never bothered to check it in the mirror, but he feels self conscious all the same.

“Leave him alone, fatass,” says Clyde, momentarily postponing a thumb-war with Stan. “They’re just stretch marks. I’ve got them on my thighs because I’m dummy thicc.” He raises his shorts to display the purple-hued lines that streak his inner thighs.

Stan pinches the bridge of his nose. “Jesus Christ, Clyde! I can practically see your balls, dude.”

“Oh yeah, sorry. No homo, bro. Either way, shut up, Cartman. Craig probably got those whips from your mom anyway.”

Cartman barrels into Clyde with force. He stands strong against him, and the Ultimate Supreme Masculinity tournament unofficially begins. The crowd yells cheers of encouragement to fight, something which Tweek and Craig have no interest in.

“Are you okay?” Tweek says, as he quickly ties his laces to get out of the room. Jimmy has taken to spraying more Axe around the wrestling boys ‘for the atmosphere’, and it makes his nose itch and his lungs tight. The rest of the boys don’t seem to mind, though he notices Stan making a speedy exit, coughing as he leaves.

“Maybe. Do you think girls would care I’ve got that on my back?”

“No, dude. I don’t think so. I don’t think it makes you unattractive,” Tweek says honestly.

Craig leans in closer so Tweek can hear him over the chanting. Despite the terrible stench of the changing room, Tweek still manages to smell like coffee. Craig doesn’t hate it; it feels like home. “Can I come over Saturday?”

“Maybe. PC Principal heard me practicing in the music room and now he wants me to play in front of everyone in the school. It’s freaking me out, man.”

“Damn, that sucks.” Craig does little to hide his disappointment. Saturdays have become their favourite day of the week. Between the kisses, the two have enjoyed each other’s company, whether they’ve been at the cinema or just hanging out at home. He puts a little distance in between them, in case anyone happened to look over to see two boys close together. “Can I listen to you practice anyway? I’ll do my homework in the background.”

“Yeah, that sounds alright. Don’t distract me though,” he says with a small smile.

They spring into action and get ready to leave the gym together. The two fighting boys have turned into a dog-pile of adolescents, each of them taking it in turns to flop on top of the heap, growing it in turn. It’s not unusual behaviour from their peers, but they’re glad they’re not involved.

“That’s pretty gay, dude,” Craig says as he motions to the mound, where Butters falls on top to claim himself the ultimate champion.

“Yep. Way gayer than kissing other boys.”

 

* * *

 

Craig arrives early that Saturday. He pulls Tweek into a kiss as soon as the door is closed, keeping their agreement a secret from prying eyes.

“I meant what I said, Craig,” Tweek says, as he pulls away from his friend. “I’ve got to practice for this assembly, so I can’t be super entertaining.”

Craig follows Tweek into the living room where he watches him promptly sit at the piano and practice his scales.

Craig takes this as his cue to set up camp on the couch and removes heavy textbooks from his backpack. Time passes slowly when he tries to study. No position feels comfortable, no words feel like they’re being read. He skims the pages and the paragraphs feel like they’re dancing straight out of his brain as soon as they enter. He goes over the pages a fourth time, a fifth time, but nothing sticks. The notebook is adorned with ridiculous doodles instead of any equations at all. Frustrated, he turns to his phone and opens up Twitter to catch up on the latest classroom gossip.

“Hey Tweek, did you hear that Clyde-”

The melodies grind to a halt. “Craig. Shhh.”

When Craig looks over, Tweek is giving him a side-eye, before setting himself up to play again. He wiggles his fingers and stretches his back and-

“It’s just that-”

“Seriously! I mean it,” Tweek huffs. “If you’re not careful, I’ll come over there and, ngh, I dunno, tickle you to death, or something!

“Oh no. Don’t do that,” Craig says with no emotion whatsoever. It would be a welcome break from what seems to be the worst study session in the history of the universe. Ultimately he decides it’s for the best if he just lets Tweek continue his practice; he already looks stressed to the nines and would rather he wasn’t any more worked up.

Surprisingly, Craig manages to focus once he changes subject. He put the math textbooks aside for physics and found himself absorbed by the workings of gravity, of forces and Newton’s laws of motion.

He gets distracted by soulful tinkering on the piano, a slow and melodic tune that feels soothing to the soul. Simple almost, yet the complexity lies in how it makes him think and feel; like everything is right in the world, or perhaps that everything is going to be. It’s not a happy feeling though, nor is it sad - perhaps a feeling of fullness, or complacent satisfaction. Either way, it makes Craig feel content with his lot in life. He makes his way over to Tweek and puts his hands on his shoulders from behind.

“What are you playing?”

“Trois Gymnopédies. I think it’s beautiful.” Tweek continues to make the piano sing heartfelt chords and as he looks up, he sees Craig smiling down at him. Craig leans down to plant a small, upside-down kiss to Tweek’s forehead, who in turn stops playing to pull his friend down further to meet their lips.

“It is beautiful,” Craig confirms, smiling.

Tweek lets out a huge yawn. “Nngh, all this practicing is exhausting,” he says through a hearty exhale, before quickly clarifying he was referring to piano and not their arrangement.

“Want me to fix you a coffee?”

“Please,” he says, and gives him another small peck.

As Craig goes to the kitchen to work the espresso machine, he hears Tweek back at the keys. The melodies get drowned out by the whirring, crunching, screaming of the machine until the bitter brown liquid starts to pour. The gentle notes of the piano comes back then, soft and harmonious, until Tweek stops to take the drink from Craig. He thanks him as he takes a sip, and rests it on a nearby table and places it out of sight.

Tweek slides over to the far left of the small bench that he sits on to play the piano and motions for Craig to sit next to him. The seat is far too small for two growing boys; their legs are pressed together in an attempt to utilize as much space as possible but neither of them seem to mind all that much - or at least, neither have moved over so they aren’t touching.

“This one here,” Tweek motions to a white key to the left of a pair of black keys, “is C.” He taps it, and a single cheerful note sounds from the piano. “You try.”

Craig presses the key, as per Tweek’s instructions. The note rings out just as clearly as Tweek’s had, and he looks at his tutor, proud to be learning.

“Okay! Now we’ve found the C, show me the D.”

The pair look at each other and snigger as only immature fifteen year olds would.

“You did that on purpose.”

“Yeah, I did,” Tweek wipes a tear of laughter budding from his eye. He playfully bumps into Craig’s shoulder, and he gets a soft bump back in return. Neither of them go too hard; the size of the bench won’t allow for any true rowdiness else they’d fall off in a split second. They reposition themselves on the bench, making sure they stay steady and secure. The proximity to Craig stirs up something strange in Tweek’s gut; the body heat makes him feel uncomfortable but it’s not unwelcome. He puts it to the back of his mind for now.

The piano hums a note that’s not quite D when Craig puts his fingers to the keys.

“Ah, that’s C-sharp -- or D-flat, depending on the type of music you’re playing.”

Craig moves his finger over and the piano makes a soft note. Encouraged, he finds the next notes from Tweek’s instructions. They play clearly yet simply, one by one until he reaches C again.

Tweek takes Craig’s compliant hand back over to the first note they played, and spreads his fingers across the keys. He instructs Craig to play a series of notes, which plays a little ditty that he instantly recognises as Old MacDonald Had a Farm. His face lights up having played something identifiable, and when he goes to play again, Tweek joins in with gentle chords to complement his playing. It’s beautiful and harmonious, even when the notes are wrong.

As they bring the song to a close, Tweek wraps his arm around Craig’s waist and brings him in for a small kiss. That strange feeling is back again. It swishes and swirls around his stomach; it reminds Tweek of being spun around in the teacups at a funfair, or perhaps the same feeling of when his name gets called to the principal’s office over the tannoy at school. It’s mixed with the feeling like his heart is closer to his throat than to his chest. Tweek doesn’t know what to make of it and he feels the tension build in his body.

“It’s a bit stupid,” Craig says breaking apart from Tweek momentarily, “that I’m playing E-I-E-I-O when the notes only go from A to G.”

The pressure melts away at Craig’s joke.

“Ugh, I better get back to practicing, man. This piano isn’t going to play itself -- I just, why did I even agree to this?” Tweek tilts his head to the ceiling and closes his eyes. He lets out a huge sigh and wonders how he ever got himself into this mess. The thought of performing something in front of the whole school is particularly terrifying, even if he knows that he’s blessed with the piano and has been for the majority of his life. Music was a way for him to express himself, for him to display his emotions how he wished - and there were a lot of them - but being strong-armed into sharing his talent felt like an invasion of his privacy. Those emotions are being forced out. Is his artistry even his own if he’s being made to share it? He’s brought out of his thoughts when he feels a pair of hands take his own out of his hair.

“It’s okay, Tweek. You’ll do great.”

He takes a deep exhale and opens his eyes to see Craig’s sympathetic face. Their hands stay connected for longer than they should, yet not an uncomfortable amount of time by any means. Tweek appreciates the touch; it’s comforting in ways he hasn’t always experienced.

Craig notices the time before Tweek does. “Oh shit. It’s twenty past three. What time are your parents back again?”

“Ten minutes,” he grumbles in reply.

“One for the road?”

They lean in together, aware that they haven’t spent much time locking lips. It’s soft, with just the right amount of passion to quicken beating teen hearts. Hands wander to hair, faces, necks, having greatly improved on their first attempt since they’d come to their arrangement. They didn’t pay much attention to the time, letting themselves enjoy each others’ company. When they look back at the clock, they regrettably see they’ve got less than five minutes left.

“I uh, better go. In case your parents catch us,” Craig breathes heavily, and reluctantly separates himself from his friend. He throws on the jacket he discarded carelessly earlier and throws his textbooks in his backpack with speed.

“Catch you later, Tweek. Thanks for the practice,” Craig says with a small wave as Tweek sees him out. He isn’t sure whether Craig was referring to kissing or the piano, but he’ll take the gratitude all the same. He catches Craig smiling as he returns the goodbye and closes the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can catch me on Tumblr @ sun-sparks. Come say hi.


	3. Halo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two performances could not go more differently.

On the Wednesday that Tweek is due to play, Craig waits in anticipation. Tension hangs in the air in the hall; the room is full of bored teenagers that simultaneously don't care for the assembly but are glad to be free from wherever dull lesson they weren't engaged with.

The assembly is opened by an awkward clarinet rendition of _My Heart Will Go On_ , and joined by the percussive hi-hat tittering of mocking students. Craig finds himself gently ushered to the side by Principal Victoria, who frantically whispers that Tweek has gone missing and begs for him to find his friend to get him on stage in the next twenty minutes.

Ultimately, Craig finds Tweek in the nearest bathroom, breathing deeply and furiously flicking his fidget spinners. Tears threaten to spill down his cheeks when Craig asks if he's okay.

"I'm freaking the fuck out, man," he begins with another forceful flick to the plastic. "I'm going to look like an absolute dick out there."

"But you're great," Craig says with the utmost sincerity. "Besides, even if you doubt your own incredible talent, you can't be worse than the first guy."

"Who was it?"

"I dunno, some goth kid."

Tweek throws his head back to the ceiling and wipes at his eyes, tears subsiding. "Oh, really? Damn it, I missed it being so wrapped up in my own bullshit."

"It was terrible," Craig laughs.

"Pete's actually a really good clarinet player. He said he wanted to ruin the song for all the ' _preppy Barbie and Ken conformist posers_ ' in the audience." Tweek pushes his hair in front of his face and gives it a dramatic swoop with his head in imitation.

"A masterpiece."

Tweek lazily fingers the spinner, making it go round and round clockwise before hitting his hand, and then back again the other way. "I don't even know why I'm so freaked out for. Stage fright and anxiety and whether I'm even good enough to play anything in front of the school."

"But I've heard you and you're awesome."

"Nnggggghhhwhat the fuck was I thinking picking Beyoncé? If I fuck up, everyone will know. This is too much pressure, man. I should have just picked something classical that nobody knows."

Tweek goes to flick the spinner again but his hands are caught gently in Craig's. He holds them still and looks Tweek in the eye. "You'll be fine, Tweek. I promise. I believe in you."

Tweek's breath catches in his throat when he finds Craig's lips unexpectedly on his. It's soft, fleeting and imbues him with a sudden confidence to make this performance the best of his life so far. He radiates energy and a big smile brightens his face. Craig's cheeks flush a rosy red.

“Uh, Go out there and smash it, Tweek.”

Craig shuffles his feet. He barely look Tweek in the eye; the shame from a kiss on a day that's not Saturday makes guilt and fear rise up to his throat. Tweek hasn't seemed to notice - or perhaps he has. Regardless, he wraps his arms around Craig and pulls him in for a tight hug. Craig slowly does the same and rests his head temporarily in the crook of Tweek's shoulder.

"Thank you, Craig," he says as he eases off his friend.

"No problem," Craig utters quietly, putting those feelings of discomfort away. "Let's go."

Back at the assembly hall, Craig takes his seat and tentatively waits for Tweek to come on the stage. He sits bored through a pretty mediocre performance of _Let It Go_ ; he's heard Tweek sing as he practices piano and he'd sing it better. A loud snort-laugh sounds out loud enough to make the singer stumble slightly and he looks across the row to see Clyde and Jimmy get pulled up from their seats by a stern looking teacher. If he focuses enough, he can just about lip-read ' _quit screwing around'_ as they're marched out of the hall. The clickety-clack of Jimmy's crutches distract the entire audience and he almost feels sorry for the girl on stage who looks ready to give up.

When Tweek finally arrives on stage, he sits upright in his chair. From eight rows back, he sees Tweek take a deep breath before he sits at the piano. They make eye contact and he gives an encouraging thumbs up.

When Tweek plays the first few bars to _Halo_ , the room falls silent. Craig beams with pride as he plays every note perfectly; his fingers dance across the keys with precision, every note joined together effortlessly in a beautiful, familiar melody. Tweek looks utterly entranced during his playing. The world outside of his piano doesn't exist, but if it did, he'd be a magician by the way he's leaving everyone spellbound. As Craig looks across the audience he notices the only person whose eyes aren't on Tweek is himself. He sits back happily until he finishes his piece and joins in the roaring applause that breaks about across the room. Tweek looks incredibly awkward about the whole thing; he gives a small nod and a wave of his hand before dashing off the stage.

No matter how much Craig looks for Tweek, he can't find him until the very end of the school day where he looks exhausted at his locker. His shoulders are tense and he looks particularly frazzled. Whether this is from the adrenaline of performing or otherwise, Craig isn't sure, but he looks ready to go home.

“Tweek, you were so good!”

He visibly relaxes when he sees Craig. "Thanks, man," he says smiling. "I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“I really didn’t do anything."

After a moment or two of silence, Tweek furrows his brows. “Can you believe Annie asked me out on a date?”

Craig's mood unexpectedly drops. His smile falters and his heart sinks. It takes them both by surprise. “Oh. When?”

“Saturday.”

“But we have plans for Saturday.”

Tweek looks visibly disappointed. He was expecting excitement but got bitter and disinterested instead. “Can we take a raincheck?"

"Can't you just reschedule with her?"

"She said she wanted to do it on Saturday. I can't ask to swap just after saying yes."

"That's bullshit," Craig grumbles.

"It's not bullshit, when's the next time a girl is going to ask me out? Nngh, never, man! That's when! She'll think I'm lame and just cancel the whole thing." Tweek takes a moment to collect his thoughts. He takes a deep breath and racks his brain to think of a suitable compromise. "Do you want to double-date? Annie could bring--"

"No!" Craig exclaims a little too quickly, a little too loudly.

"Why not?"

"Because I don't _want_ to!"

Tweek pulls at his hair, exasperated. His friend should be happy for him, yet he stands opposite, frowning, jealous. "Then I don't-- I don't understand the fucking problem, Craig!"

"Because Saturdays are _our_ day."

"Well, this weekend it's going to have to be _my_ day," responds says sternly. The buzz of the afternoon has been obliterated; instead of feeling warm and happy, he feels let down and frustrated.

"Fuck you, dude," Craig says, storming off. He raises his middle fingers to Tweek with his back turned; neither can see the betrayed look on the other's face, nor do they care to let each other see it. "Have fun on your fucking date."


	4. Pathétique

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The emotions of a teenage boy are strong and turbulent.

The morning rays of sunshine assaults Craig’s face with a fierce brightness at a time he deems too early to be awake on a Saturday. Realistically, it’s not even that early - it’s closer to lunch than it is to breakfast, but he pulls his duvet over his head anyway to block out the sun. Today is a day for sleeping in; he doesn’t have any plans. Too awake to go back to sleep and too tired to do anything else, he grabs at his phone to while away the time.

The phone is too bright underneath the covers. He flinches when the illuminating screen lights up and he rubs at his face to make the ache in his eyes go away. The many notifications from the evening make him sigh. He hastily swipes away the conversation bubble from Tweek without even checking any of the 5 messages he’d sent in the night. Not many of them have been checked in the past few days. It’s been the same at school, Craig understands it’s petty, but he’s hurt and can’t find the will to be as close to Tweek in these past few days. One or two word responses are all he’s seemed to manage lately, choosing to invest his time in something else. That something else happens to be his PS4. 

The fans in the machine whirl obnoxiously loud when he turns it on. It’s old and well used and he doubts it’ll make it through another year. The seemingly endless list of games he’s acquired over the years offer nothing he wants to play today. Tweek has been trying to message him through the console. Craig elects to ignore these messages too. 

It hasn’t been unnoticed by Tweek. He’s been especially persistent and nagging at lunch times and has come to sending message upon message when he doesn’t get an answer. Tweek feels bad for their falling out, Craig knows this is true. He doesn’t know how to feel about this; he feels betrayed for sure, but the messages are going in some way to rectify feeling neglected and he feels like he does matter. It’s a shame he’s so stubborn - it’s too late to back down from his position on this lonely Saturday, so he chooses to mope around instead of making things better with Tweek.

He’s considered reaching out, sending a message that he hopes his date goes well even though his head and heart say otherwise. It’s mean of him to hope it bombs, but Craig can’t help it. He can’t even pinpoint why he’s so worked up about it all anyway; thinking about it just leads to a turbulent mix of emotions that he doesn’t want to deal with. A potent cocktail of disloyalty and jealousy that Craig doesn’t want to admit to makes his guts churn in a way he’s not used to. He shelves those feelings. Out of sight, out of mind.

A shrill, sing-song voice brings him out of his racing thoughts. Eyes are locked onto the television, he already knows who’s at his door, edging their way in, inch by inch. 

“Get out of my room, Trisha.”

“Mom said I should bring you some toast,” she says, rocking back on her heels. “Guess I’ll just have to eat it instead.”

Craig gives a noncommittal shrug and an unintelligible noise, somewhere between _I don’t care_ and _whatever._ He sinks back further into his cocoon of misery and tells his sister to leave the food at the door.

Her bright red pigtails bounce with enthusiasm and energy that he can’t seem to muster as she pops the plate on the carpet. “What’s wrong with you today?” 

As with all siblings, Craig never knows whether he’s about to get sympathy or outright mocking for his hardships. They have a strange relationship; they’ll bicker and argue all night, but will come to each other’s rescue if anyone else dared get involved. For a girl of ten, Trisha is feistier than she needs to be. Ultimately, he’s not willing to toss that coin of fate, so he opts for a short but sweet response: “Nothing.”

His sister leans into the door frame. If her feet stay out of the room, she’s technically not inside, she reasons. Her hands grip the frame for support, balancing herself far enough inside to annoy him. If she falls, she’ll surely descend into her meagre offering of burnt toast. Trisha pushes the boundaries of Craig’s space by doing so, eliciting a scowl from the moody teen. “If nothing’s wrong, why are you being such a little bitch?”

“Go fuck yourself, Trish.”

The coin lands on petty quarrels. He throws a middle finger her way and she returns one back.

“Is it because your girlfriend is busy today?”

The tension he felt through the week is released by an aggravating little sister. It explodes and flows through him in a way he hadn’t expected, throwing pillows in the direction of the door. He doesn’t even know why he’s doing it. The emotions spill out of him uncontrollably for reasons he doesn’t entirely understand. “Tweek _isn’t my boyfriend!”_ None of the missiles hit their target and his sister runs away, laughing maniacally about fuckboys. 

Craig slumps back into bed and promptly takes a vicious knock from the headboard. He looks at the pillows laying miserably on the floor as he rubs his head. He doesn't care to move from the bed to reclaim them; he glares at them, willing them to come to him through telekenisis, Jedi force or otherwise. When the pillows don't come back to him by magic, he lazily grabs the duvet to take their place instead. All in all, it takes more time and energy to arrange the blanket in a way that keeps him both warm and comfortable than it would have just to collect the cushions, but Craig is feeling fragile and spiteful so on the floor they stay.

His stomach growls with a vengeance and quickly realises his breakfast resides under a mountain of pillows. He screams a muffled yell into his duvet before reluctantly getting up to check the damage. Two pillows are covered in peanut butter. The coverings are tossed to the side to be washed later and he eats the toast anyway, disregarding any and all importance of food hygiene. Craig eats his breakfast sat on the floor, casually throwing the pillows in the way of the bed. Some of them miss, but that’s a problem for later.

His phone buzzes dramatically on the side table. Craig abandons his plate to the floor to take a glance at his phone. It’s Tweek again. Fingers itch as he contemplates whether or not to open the message, but in the end he decides not to. The phone vibrates some more. It’s hard to ignore Tweek; every part of him says look at the message, respond to the text - but he won’t, out of principle.

Instead, Craig focuses on the first game he can find on his PS4 that doesn’t look lame. It’s been a while since he played Grand Theft Auto. Too much time is spent driving around aimlessly, until he remembers he could probably just pick a racing game to do that. It’s almost like a trance; when he picks a different game, he just drives around and around on whatever track he chose until the next one comes. He stands to do the same thing over and over - he barely even notices his phone blow up with calls and messages until far later in the evening, when his mother calls him down for dinner. He doesn’t check any of them.

“Morning, Craig,” his father says sarcastically as he tucks into his food.

A wave of middle fingers is embraced across the table, a strange family greeting that’s become second nature. They’re not even sure if it means anything now.

“Craig, you actually fucking stink--”

“ _Language, Trisha_. But she’s right,” remarks his mom. “Have you even been in the shower today?”

It’s true - he hadn’t. He spent the entire day in a t-shirt and sweatpants, not bothering to get in the shower. It was out of pure laziness, really. He wasn’t going anywhere and he just wanted to stay in bed playing video games. Craig is in the middle of an excuse as to why he hadn’t at least put on deodorant when he’s distracted by his phone vibrating vigorously against his leg.

His mom uses this as a gateway to chastise him for being idle, bringing up the possibility of girls thinking he’s gross if he doesn’t keep himself clean - how will he ever expect to get a partner when they can smell him from a mile away? It serves as another painful reminder that Tweek has been on a date today and he hasn’t. Craig wolfs down the rest of his dinner and sulks his way up the stairs and into the shower. When he gets into bed, clean and with fresh linen, he finally looks at his messages.

**Tweek: 11:16**

_Craig what do I west on this date???_

_wear_

_Can I just turn up in a hoody?????_

_I don’t understand how girls work_

_Help me_

 

**Tweek: 12:54**

_3 missed calls_

 

**Tweek: 13:01**

_I’m having second thoughts_

_Give me a sign to quit_

_Or keep goin_

_Or something_

 

**Tweek: 13:27**

_Ok i’m gonna keep going_

_Wish me luck_

 

**Tweek: 16:41**

_Craig I don’t like this_

_Come bail me out_

_please_

 

**Tweek: 17:43**

_2 missed calls_

 

**Tweek: 19:05**

_5 missed calls_

 

**Tweek: 19:17**

_3 missed calls_

 

**Tweek: 19:18**

_Craig, pick up_

_I really need you_

 

**Tweek: 19:41**

_1 missed call_

 

**Tweek: 19:54**

_Please_

_Please pick up_

 

**Tweek: 20:16**

_I’m sorry for ditching you_

_I shouldn’t have gone on this date_

_Please call me_

_Please_

_Pleas_

 

**Tweek: 21:33**

_Please call me when you see these messages_

_I’m sorry_

_Please call me_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm on holiday from today onwards, so I'm posting this now. There won't be a chapter for the next week and a bit at least, hope you enjoy the cliffhanger!


	5. Kinderszenen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What happened last Saturday? A pair become a couple.

After a few classes of awkward ignoring on Monday morning, Craig finally catches up to Tweek during their first break. He's sitting alone on a wall facing away from the school and looking at his breath floating away in the chilly Colorado air. Its wispy appearance comes and goes, here one second and gone the next; fleeting like the thoughts and feelings of hormonal teenagers. The fidget spinner rotates rapidly. Its whirring noise joins the breeze of the wind and the idle chatter of their classmates behind them.

Craig sits down next to Tweek. The silence is unbearably uncomfortable. There's much to say and more that's been left unsaid; neither wants to be the first to say anything to the other. One breath held in the air becomes two. They emerge synchronised and disappear together into the ether. Tweek rests his head on Craig’s shoulder. 

“What kind of lame message is _‘are you okay’_?” 

“What kind of lame message is _‘I’ll tell you Monday’_?” Craig retorts.

Tweek is tired, both emotionally and physically exhausted. If Craig really thought about it, he’d realise Tweek hadn’t slept much at all during the weekend. His head is heavy, awkwardly so. Craig projects the feeling of guilt from ignoring Tweek into the weight being pressed into him. 

“It means I’ll tell you Monday,” Tweek wipes the sleep from his eyes, lets out a full-body yawn, and flicks the spinner again.

“You don’t have to tell me. I heard what happened-"

Tweek cuts him off sharply, loudly, assertively. The remnants of the dragon’s flame hang fiercely in the air, dominating the small trails of Craig’s exhales. "No, you didn't. You heard it from Annie and not me. Why didn't you call?"

“...I don't know. I guess I was upset you were on your date and I want feeling like talking to anyone.”

“That's such a jerk move,” Tweek states, sitting up to look directly at his friend. “Why didn't you say you were sad about it?”

“Cos.” 

“'Cos' what?” 

When Craig says he thought Tweek already knew, Tweek can only give him an incredulous look in response.  

Communication had never been Craig’s strong point. It always seems to come so easily for Tweek, always saying exactly what was on his mind, whether people liked to hear it or not. He always reasoned it as a problem shared being a problem halved, or that talking through his feelings helped him work out whether his anxiety and paranoia was warranted. Craig, unconsciously or not, preferred to stew on his thoughts until they became reasoned out of all existence. Of course Tweek wouldn’t know Craig had something to say about his date - how could he when he never mentioned anything at all? 

“Well, I mean, you seemed kinda salty but you used to be awful at responding to messages anyway - wait, how is this even becoming about you?”

“Sorry," Craig coughs and clears his throat. "Tell me about your date.”

"Okay so, Annie asked me out after that assembly, like, straight away. And I thought that was really weird because it's not like it was even that good-"

"It was," Craig interjects. 

Tweek shakes his head forcefully. "It wasn't." Craig bites his tongue and rolls his eyes, not that Tweek can see it from his position back in the crook of Craig's neck. "Anyway, she says we should hang on Saturday and go to the movies. I got all ngh, swept up in it and said yes without even thinking about it. Then you got mad at me for missing our weekend together."

"…Yeah." Craig chooses this opportunity to pull his hat over his eyes. He fidgets with the strings and plays with the tassels that hang low. It's old and worn. The colours have faded from too many washes over too many years and it's become horribly misshapen. It's a source of near constant comfort in times of stress, moodiness and on the rare occasion, embarrassment.

"You were being such a dick about that."

"You don't have to tell me again," Craig sighs.

"I know, but it's worth mentioning because you were."

"How was it you didn't know I was stressy over your date again?"

"Because you never let anything bother you for more than a day," Tweek says with a yawn and closes his eyes. He gets back on track quickly; this is about him and not Craig. "Anyway, Saturday comes around and I'm all nervous for this date and I realised I didn't really want to go."

“If you didn't want to go, why did you say yes?”

Tweek falters for a moment. He sits up, looks at his shoes, his legs, his hands. "Oh god, it's embarrassing. I… just look at me, Craig. Who would find this attractive?" He gestures to his body awkwardly, pointing out the bits of himself that he doesn't like - and to a teenager, there are a lot of them. The struggle with self-image is a battle he finds himself going through daily, constantly at war with his mind and rapidly changing body. "I didn't think anyone else would ever want to date me so I said yes because otherwise I'm doomed to a life of loneliness."

"That's stupid, you're great the way you are." Heat rises on Craig's face for reasons he doesn’t want to identify. The quick flush reminds him of how his skin is so annoyingly prone to turning red at the slightest provocation. He's sure Tweek will have noticed; he's looking at him - really looking at him to the point he's almost unnerved. He clears his throat again and prompts him to get back to the story.

"Right, so we end up going to the cinema and Annie’s, like, touching me throughout the entire time."

Something turns in the pit of Craig's stomach and it makes him feel nauseous. It feels heavy, like it dropped in a place that it shouldn't be. He tries his best not to let his face betray his internal feelings and opts for a single monotonous "oh".

"Yeah. Like, her hand was on my thigh and everything and I just really wanted to watch the film. I kept moving it back."

That feeling makes itself known again and Craig does little to hide his disgust."Girls are gross."

"Right? So I keep moving her hand away and it keeps coming back. And then at the end of the movie, she just gets this weird look in her eyes and she…"

"She what?"

Tweek leans in close to Craig, as if what he was about to say would start a third world war should it be heard by the wrong people. His voice wavers in a whisper. “ _She said she heard piano players are good at fingering and all the girls were racing to ask me out and that she was so happy she got to me first and then she tried to kiss me_ , _man!_ ” By the end of the sentence, Tweek is speaking rapidly; he takes a deep breath, remembers to breathe and watches his breath swirl through the air as he had done before.

"Ugh, girls suck," The words get caught in Craig's throat. "What happened then?"

"You probably know the rest. I pushed her off, she got mad at me, said I was frigid and that she'd tell the school I was a shit kisser."

"But you're not, I would know. And Annie is gross anyway."

"Yeah. But then I got thinking, I don't think I want to kiss any girls," Tweek admits as he stares at his feet. The thought of looking Craig in the eye is too much pressure as he says what's on his mind. He imagines his happy place: a flower-filled meadow where the sun shines brightly on his skin. The world outside of his head is cold, harsh and full of gossip from small minds. He keeps his eyes closed and listens to the spinning of the toy in his right hand. "I just thought I wanted to because it's what everyone else is doing." 

Silence surrounds Tweek’s confession. With the pair so quiet, the birdsong and whistle of the wind seems louder than normal. Their classmates in the background are too far away to matter now.

"…What about me?" Craig says softly.

"What about you?"

"Do you like kissing me?"

Tweek looks into Craig's deep green eyes and gives a small, sincere nod. It's like Tweek gazing directly into his soul. He feels vulnerable and bare, even more so when he says "Is that okay?". Craig's mouth goes dry; it _is_ okay, and he's not sure what that means for him, for Tweek and for them together. Words don’t make it past his lips - he just nods with a vacant look on his face. 

“Does this mean you’re gay?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.” Closing his eyes seems like the only thing Tweek can do right now, despite wanting to look at Craig. He tries to go back to his happy place but the cold air nips at him with aggression. It places him firmly in the here and now. “Do you like kissing me, too?”

“I do. But I’m not, you know. _Gay.”_ The word is bitter on his lips, forbidden; a curse word almost. Craig stares into the distance, looking at nothing in particular. The cord of his hat wraps around his fingers, pulling it up and down. He appreciates how tactile it is.

“Do you even like girls, dude? You keep calling them gross.”

Craig scoffs affirmatively, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world. 

“Who?”

The answer has always been clear-cut to Craig. He’s thought about this during many sleepovers with his friends and the conversation turns to dating their classmates - not that he ever told anyone. “Nobody here. They all suck.” 

“Celebrities then?”

Craig pauses to think about his answer, and in truth, not a single lady comes into his mind. He shrugs when he can't come up with a name. Tweek looks at him puzzled. “I don’t know. There must be some girl out there. I just haven’t met her yet.”

“And what about boys?”

“Don’t make me answer that,” he says, looking away. “But I can't be. My dad would kill me.”

“Your dad isn’t that bad.” Following the pathway of Craig’s shoulder, Tweek trails his hand down his arm until he’s able to lace their fingers together neatly. Craig’s gloves act as a barrier between their skin; close but not close enough. Something in the way of feeling really connected. Craig unconsciously swallows nothing at all. 

“You know, it’s really stupid,” Craig declares to the open air, staring out into the mountains. “When you went on your date, it almost felt like you cheated on me. And that's stupid because we weren't- aren't even together… and then I got mad about it.”

“You’re such a dope.”

Craig caresses Tweek’s cold hand with his gloved thumb. They’re far away enough from the rest of the school to not worry about who sees such an overt display of affection. He takes a moment to think about who would care, who wouldn’t care; whether Clyde and the rest of his friends would be supportive or get weird about this new revelation and gossip with their classmates? For now, Craig reasons he can think about it later. He dips his head to lay a soft, practiced kiss on Tweek’s lips who thankfully reciprocates. Kissing Tweek feels natural, feels right and it always had. 

“What now?” murmurs Tweek as they briefly part. 

“I don’t know. Does this mean we’re boyfriends?”

“Do you want to be?”

“What am I going to tell my dad?” Craig whispers.

“We can worry about it later.”

As the bell rings to round up all the kids to class, Tweek leans in and kisses Craig sweetly. They hop off the wall together and walk towards their respective classes hand in hand. Suddenly the gossip from the weekend doesn’t seem so bad; the pair can give everyone something more fun to talk about. Two sets of footprints mark untouched snow. Relationships are unfamiliar territory to the boys but they’re willing to give it a go. 

Craig pulls Tweek in to peck him on the cheek as they walk to their lessons. “You wanna show Annie how good we got at kissing?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking with it, folks, that's me done!
> 
> If you want to hear the 'soundtrack', or piano pieces that the chapters are named after:
> 
> Nocturnes, op 9; No 2 - Chopin  
> Trois Gymnopédies: No 1 - Satie  
> Piano Sonata No. 8: Pathétique - Beethoven  
> Kinderszenen Op 15:1 - Robert Schumann
> 
> (and if you're not done with the classical music recommendations and want more, check out La Campanella! I don't think Tweek would be quite good enough to play it yet, but you never know. Practice, practice, kids!)


End file.
